With the season over for 2012, sights are now set on the ITU World Champs in London in September 2013. Qualification race booked at the Dambuster in June, so 7 months of graft awaits!

Retract previous "Spanish weather" statement.

by jamesrunchmanNov 14th 2012

Ok, all is not lost. Today, you will be pleased to hear, the weather here on the Costa Blanca has been great. A bit windy at times but sunny and warm! Picture at the top of the blog taken in Calpe at around 4 o'clock after a late lunch in a beach restaurant. However the day was not without slight problems.

It all started out well with a great swim in the flat, calm and reasonably warm waters of Benidorm (I even managed to zip up the wetsuit after the gargantuan Chinese meal from the night before). This was followed by coffee and cake (there's always time for cake - see below) in a seaside coffee shop, back to the house, post swim admin and then out on the bikes.

We had travelled the 5 miles down the hill to get on the road to Calpe when it went wrong! John hit a speed ramp a bit too fast and heard an immediate, telling hiss and quickly rolled to a standstill with a flat rear tyre (a pinch flat). Not a massive problem I hear you say! Just replace the inner tube with the spare that EVERYBODY carries when they are cycling DON'T THEY? Not quite! His spare tube had a 70mm valve, when he needed a 90mm one to reach through his 50mm carbon rims. Mine were too short also so we were slightly stuck (offending articles pictured below). Now you are saying - "What about a puncture repair kit then"? Nooooo! So we managed to ascertain the whereabouts of a local sports shop by impressive use of pigeon Spanish in a nearby Burger King, John then jumped on my bike to find the shop. About an hour later (and after a BK Flamer (other fast food restaurants are available) large fries and strawberry milkshake - in fairness I had nothing else to do) whilst I looked after the other bike John returned with a puncture repair kit. After the puncture was fixed and a couple of espressos later we were off and running along the coastal road to Calpe.

We then managed to get a little "geographically embarrassed" around the outskirts of Benidorm (my fault as I had the map). In my defence, the map beared very little in resemblance to the ground, that's my excuse anyway. Eventually we got to the road we were after and hand-railed the coast to Calpe. Another stunning ride once out of the confines of the towns! Hit Calpe and had a late lunch (view from restaurant below) then retraced our steps (er, wheels) back along the coast to Benidorm. This was fantastic, the wind was behind us all the way, I think we did it in just over half the time of the way out.

Now back at the house and tucked into a massive chilli con carne that a couple of the other lads had cooked (my turn to burn the food on Friday) and a large glass of vino rojo, this is the life! Tomorrow; early morning swim planned, followed by a long hilly bike back up in the mountains, might run off the bike also but will see how it goes. Living the dream!